A young girl leans on a traffic light where she has a bird’s eye view of the St. Patrick’s Day Parade in Cork.
| Aperture | ƒ/7.1 |
| Camera | Canon EOS 20D |
| Focal length | 200mm |
| ISO | 200 |
| Shutter speed | 1/250s |
Author Archives: Donncha
St Patrick’s Day 2008 in Cork
A flavour of the St Patrick’s Day festivities and people who attended the Parade in Cork yesterday.
Some of the Special Olympics Team took part in the parade and as I said yesterday, it was strange to see only them on the street with nobody else about. Everyone cheered them on however and clapped as they passed! The next group took at least 5 minutes to appear leaving me to wonder if the parade had already finished.
You normally don’t see Irish people waving flags about unless it’s a special occasion. St. Patrick’s Day is one of those times when the the Irish Tricolour comes out!
If there’s a buck to be made ..
Crowds lined Patrick’s Street in Cork to watch the Parade. It was crazy! To get any sort of shot I had to either hold my camera in the air and shoot blind or grab quick shots with the zoom from between the bobbing heads of those in front of me. If you were in any way uncomfortable with crowds then it wasn’t the place for you.
More tomorrow and for a few days probably.
| Aperture | ƒ/11 |
| Camera | Canon EOS 20D |
| Focal length | 33mm |
| ISO | 200 |
| Shutter speed | 1/200s |
St. Patrick’s Day is for the kids
A young girls waves her Irish flag in the air after spotting part of the St. Patrick’s Day Parade in Cork approaching.
I shot several decent shots but it’s late and I’m tired. I was quite disappointed with the parade and left after half an hour. Like previous years there were huge gaps between some of the groups partaking in the parade.
It was strange to see the Special Olympics group striding up Patrick’s Street all alone with no other group in sight. They proudly showed off their medals and the crowd cheered and clapped for them. I’ll have a photo of them up here later in the week.
| Aperture | ƒ/10 |
| Camera | Canon EOS 20D |
| Focal length | 125mm |
| ISO | 200 |
| Shutter speed | 1/320s |
Church Flowers
Flowers outside The Lough Parish Church, “Church of the Immaculate Conception”.
You can read more about the church and mass times at the The Lough Parish page on the Diocese website.
| Aperture | ƒ/6.3 |
| Camera | Canon EOS 20D |
| Focal length | 10mm |
| ISO | 200 |
| Shutter speed | 1/100s |
Heads up at the Lough
This was shot from a precarious position. I jumped up on one of the concrete posts dotted around the pond and very carefully snapped a couple of shots. I just about managed to balance there for a few minutes! See the two black swans everyone else was shooting?
From left to right: Donal, Ryan, Kevin, Katie and Sean spotted me and started shooting the biggest birdbrain there ..
| Aperture | ƒ/6.3 |
| Camera | Canon EOS 20D |
| Focal length | 10mm |
| ISO | 200 |
| Shutter speed | 1/200s |
A big head is natural
I was setting up a shot by placing that wheel cap leaning on the bus shelter when these two teenagers ran across the road carrying a football goal between them!
Anyway, there’s the Murphy’s stout advert I wanted to shoot. I wonder if they advertise anywhere else in the country?
| Aperture | ƒ/6.3 |
| Camera | Canon EOS 20D |
| Focal length | 10mm |
| ISO | 100 |
| Shutter speed | 1/125s |
The pigeon flies away!
Besides the beautiful swans, there’s the usual gathering of pigeons waddling along on the path picking up bread crumbs.
Too tempting. I had to chase after them and encourage them to fly a little. Some of them need the exercise!
| Aperture | ƒ/6.3 |
| Camera | Canon EOS 20D |
| Focal length | 10mm |
| ISO | 200 |
| Shutter speed | 1/800s |
Feed the swans at the Lough
Girls feed the swans at the Lough on Sunday afternoon.
Urban acid 🙂
Will posted his first photo from the day on his blog. He did arrive late, but he made up for lost time!
| Aperture | ƒ/6.3 |
| Camera | Canon EOS 20D |
| Focal length | 10mm |
| ISO | 200 |
| Shutter speed | 1/500s |
The Swan’s Wings
You really only appreciate how large and imposing a swan is when they rear up out of the water and spread their magnificent wings. While at The Lough on Sunday there were a number of fights between swans. Guess it’s that time of the year again, eh?
The swans were fairly tame towards us humans, and allowed us to shoot quite closely, but I’ve had run ins with swans before and I’m always suspicious of them!
Katie caught me as I lay on the ground to get a shot of The Lough Church. Embarrassed? Me? Never, I’ve been in many other more compromising situations just to get a shot!
Ryan posted a whole set of photos from the day and Kevin has posted his first shot.
| Aperture | ƒ/6.3 |
| Camera | Canon EOS 20D |
| Focal length | 21mm |
| ISO | 100 |
| Shutter speed | 1/320s |
That bread is mine!
A heron swoops in on a bunch of greedy gulls at The Lough yesterday!
For more pictures, check out Katie’s set and Will’s photos!
In retrospect, we were very lucky with the weather for the photowalk. Just after I got home the downpour started and 60mph winds ravaged the south of the country!
I was going to upload a bunch of the photowalk shots today but I’ll let them trickle in and then post the remainer on Friday.
| Aperture | ƒ/6.3 |
| Camera | Canon EOS 20D |
| Focal length | 88mm |
| ISO | 100 |
| Shutter speed | 1/500s |
Professional Myspace Photographer
You may have thought that a fashion photographer had an interesting life and job, but wait until you get a load of Sheffield Quigley. The one and only Myspace photographer in the whole world. I so want his job!
The Lough Photowalkers
We had a great day today. 11 people showed up at the Lough in Glasheen today for the photowalk. Pictured above are some of us. Unfortunately Patrick and Amy, and then Brendan left earlier. Thank you all for taking the time and making the effort to come. It was freezing cold and windy and it would have been so much easier to sit inside with a good book or in front of the telly!
From left to right: Sean, Kevin, Katie, Will, Donal, Sandy, Ryan and that’s me Donncha kneeling down in front. Ryan & Sandy – what’s your dog’s name again?
We stayed at the south end of the lake most of the time, probably because there was most activity there. I got plenty of shots of swans, ducks, herons and small strange black birds with a white mark. Even got a few shots of swans fighting! You can really only appreciate the size of these birds when they rise out of the air and spread their wings! Thankfully they’re very tame.
After about an hour we headed off to the Lough Church where we were filmed on CCTV taking shots of the church exterior. I wonder what the parish priest will think if he reviews those tapes in the morning. Anyway, it was getting late, I set my camera on a post, took the above shot, and afterwards myself, Kevin Will and Donal retired to The Hawthorn for some light refreshment.
If you post any photos can you tag them “corkphotowalk”? You can subscribe to the feed on the Flickr tag page or this Google Blogsearch query to see what others have posted from the day. (Google hasn’t picked up on the tag just yet.)
I had a quick look through my shots, I took 199, and there’s a couple of good ones.
Suggestions for the next photowalk? Fota perhaps? Maybe Doneraile Park?
| Aperture | ƒ/6.3 |
| Camera | Canon EOS 20D |
| Focal length | 15mm |
| ISO | 100 |
| Shutter speed | 1/60s |